By Carolyn Cole/Staff Writer

Todd Frizzell’s quick sideways glance while driving a familiar stretch of Morgan Road last week may have saved a local woman’s life.

Frizzell drives north on Morgan Road at about 10:30 a.m. most mornings, picking up Mustang Valley Elementary kindergartners for a friend who owns a local day-care center. But Dec. 20, he thought he saw something unusual out of the corner of his eye near SW 44th Street.

“When I took a double look, and there was — a Tahoe upside down in the creek (bed),” he said.

As he walked toward the black 2004 Chevrolet Tahoe, which had turned onto its driver’s-side, Frizzell said he called 911 before he saw a woman lying in the grass, her leg bent behind her. She was later identified as 31-year-old Carrie Raasch of Mustang.

“She said, ‘sir would you check on my baby. There is a baby in the car’,” he said. “I thought, ‘oh no.’ I didn’t want to go look; I was afraid of what I was going to see.”

Frizzell said he looked through the broken back window and saw the toddler hanging upside down in the car seat.

“I said, ‘Are you alright, buddy?’ Because I didn’t know if he was conscious or not, and he answered me,” he said. “So I knew he was alive.”

Frizzell said he went back over to the woman, trying to keep her talking and awake until help could arrive. She gave him her husband’s phone number, which he called.

“I figured she was probably in shock because she said she didn’t feel pain and couldn’t move,” he said. “I don’t know how long she had been there.”

Other people stopped to help, and Frizzell had to convince them not to move either mother or child until emergency crews arrived, afraid they could have suffered spinal injuries.

“I knew once the police and fire department were there I couldn’t do nothing so I left,” he said.

As of press time the 31-year-old woman was listed in fair condition at a local hospital. Later in talking with her husband Frizzell said she suffered a broken femur and hip, internal bleeding and a spinal injury. Her 3-year-old son was treated and released with a broken nose.

Oklahoma City Police Sgt Gary Knight said officers investigating the incident are uncertain how many times the sports utility vehicle rolled or what caused the vehicle, which was traveling north to drift right and off the road.

Frizzell said he’s just thankful he saw the accident, adding she told him she believed she was lying there for about 20 minutes.

“I just did what anybody should do,” he said. “I don’t want to take away from what they are going through.”